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Post by Pete on Feb 4, 2009 17:02:42 GMT
From the BBC website just now: "A diving school boss has been jailed for swindling £250,000 from the NHS for treating bogus cases of the bends." news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7869913.stmDo you swindle money from a person? I would accept that you can swindle a person out of a sum of money but the BBC's construction simply looks wrong to me.
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Post by Sue M-V on Feb 5, 2009 0:14:19 GMT
I suppose they mean "embezzling"; "swindling" doesn't sound right.
Sue
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Post by Paul Doherty on Feb 6, 2009 21:24:33 GMT
He didn't work for the NHS, so it can't be embezzlement. Looks like fraud to me, so defraud might have done. But swindle looks OK to me.
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Post by Pete on Feb 7, 2009 9:30:57 GMT
It's more the prepositions that concern me. To "swindle £250k from the NHS" looks wrong; "to swindle the NHS out of £250k" might be better.
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Post by Alan Palmer on Feb 7, 2009 12:24:19 GMT
It's certainly not wrong. AHD gives, for "swindle":
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Post by Pete on Feb 7, 2009 12:35:26 GMT
It's certainly not wrong. AHD gives, for "swindle": Thanks, Alan. It still feels wrong but it's nice to know that Auntie Beeb got this one right. Apologies to the BBC.
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